7 US Cities With The Biggest Bang For Your Buck

“Go where the jobs are” may be considered sound business and financial advice in the current economy, but what if “where those jobs are” costs more than twice the national average to live?

In the New York City area, the average pay for full-time civilian workers is 28.51/hour, nearly $6/hour above the national average of $22.71.

That might sound nice, but when you take into account that the cost of living in Manhattan is more than twice the national average (216 percent), things aren’t looking so pretty.

On the flip side, Indianapolis has a cost of living that’s much lower than the national average (87 percent), but the average wage is equally low at $19.80/hour, meaning you’re only spending less because you’re making less.

It’s no surprise that Omaha is consistently ranked a top place to live in publications like Parenting magazine and CNN.com, because this Midwestern city is actually incredibly easy on your wallet. The cost of living is 12 percent below the national average, with housing expenses 21 percent lower. According to Rent.com, average studio apartments cost just $440 per month, while a one-bedroom goes for about $515. To top it off, the average wage for full-time civilians in the Omaha-Council Bluffs area is $24.75 an hour—$2 more than national rates.

2. St. Louis

Seems like the classic Judy Garland film, Meet Me in St. Louis, was onto something. This port city on the border of Missouri and Illinois sports a cost of living that’s a full ten percentage points below the national average. Rent is the main steal here--the cost of housing is 22 percent below the nation’s average (that means you can look out for a median rent of just $535 a month, according to Rent.com). The best part? This manufacturing hub brings the city high wages, with the average full-time worker earning $22.63/hour, and those in manufacturing and construction faring even better—earning an average of $24.23/hour.

3. Dallas-Ft. Worth, Texas

They say that everything’s bigger in Texas, and in this aviation hub, your wallet could be too. That’s because these Texas cities combine wages that are on-par with the national average ($22.52/hour for full-time civilians), but cost of living rates that are much lower--about 8 percent below the national average in Dallas. The state is also lucrative for union members, who make about $25.17/hour.

NOTE: Cost of living figures are from the Census Bureau’s 2010 Cost of Living Index, the most recent data available. Wage info is from the National Compensation Survey, the most recent data available, and includes full-time civilian (or non-military) wages only (wage statistics are hourly, but the survey includes salaried employees, whose rates are converted to hourly for consistency).